While a 10-gram roll is sold for 45 pfennigs in bakeries, a kilogram of wheat in the field is worth less. Who benefits and who suffers? The wheat harvest in the largest Bosnian granary is in full swing. In front of the mills, columns of tractors are waiting to deliver the wheat to the silos – and the price is still unknown. Unofficially, from 32 to 36 pfennigs per kilogram.
The purchase has begun – the price is still unknown. The offer that is circulating at only 32 pfennigs per kilogram is far below the cost of production. That is not just a number, say farmers. It is a threat to the survival of domestic production.
“Based on our raw materials and efforts, wheat should not be below 45-50 pfennigs in the purchase. When we take the price of flour and the price of bread – one roll is 45 pfennigs, and a kilogram of wheat is 30 pfennigs. That is not a proportion. I cannot understand that a kilogram of wheat, from which 80% of flour is obtained, is worth one small roll! You can immediately see who is at a loss and who is at a profit,” points out producer Mustafa Gradaščević.
The price of wheat is determined in offices, not in the fields. Millers justify purchase prices with prices in the surrounding area, while the authorities say that they do not have mechanisms for direct intervention, leaving producers to market conditions without protection.
“We will fight, if there is no adequate price – farmers in the Association suggest that they try to protest, and we will see what happens,” says Savo Bakajlić, president of the Association of Agricultural Producers of Semberija and Majevica.
This time, the producers say, they will not only block the border crossing, as was the case a few days ago, but every entrance to the city area, until an agreement and an acceptable price are reached.
“The state is mostly to blame here, the controls and inspections that are supposed to protect us as producers, but also them as buyers. But not in this way as before. I think there is a lot of speculation, and the millers are trying to find excuses in importing flour,” says Bakajlić.
Although they initially showed their willingness to appear in front of our cameras, the Association of Bakers and Millers avoided it until the last moment. During that time, tractors with trailers full of wheat waited in lines in front of the mills – they are handing over the wheat, and they still do not know what the purchase price is.
“It is not yet known. What the millers decide next – we will see,” tells producer Cvijetin Milinković.
“The price will depend on the environment, we will not be any worse off,” says Dušan Tomić, manager of the silo of the Žitopromet unit.
Wheat is a stock exchange commodity – claim the authorities, stating that the Government does not have the tools to directly regulate the price. At the same time, economists warn that without a clear policy and protection of domestic producers, the future of domestic agriculture is uncertain.
“We have a phenomenon on the market that we cannot influence. What the Ministry can influence is to sit down, agree on a Rulebook, and pay out incentives,” says Savo Minić, Minister of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management of the RS.
“We have a government that is deceiving the people and which is completely pointless. Let them cross the border and see if the people are like this abandoned to the whims of the market anywhere in Europe except here. Everywhere there are countries with commodity reserves, everywhere the state negotiates purchase prices with agricultural producers. The idea that the market makes the state is pointless, but the state makes the market,” says economic analyst Aleksa Milojević.
While tractors are still waiting in front of the mills, farmers are preparing for protests, and the authorities remain passive – the future of domestic agriculture hangs in the balance. Without concrete protection, economists warn, the grain fields of Bosnia and Herzegovina will soon remain desolate, and domestic bread will become a luxury.
